City’s tax plan outlined

Friday

Oct 12, 2012 at 10:57 AMOct 12, 2012 at 10:59 AM

Cynthia Grau

Close to 50 members of the Pontiac business community gathered at Baby Bull’s in Pontiac for the Pontiac Area Chamber of Commerce’s first Issues and Eggs breakfast of the season Thursday.Pontiac Mayor Bob Russell was the speaker for the morning, outlining the proposed tax plan, which will appear as a referendum on the Nov. 6 ballot.The plan includes a half-percent raise in Pontiac’s sales tax and, in turn, will offer a property tax rebate to homeowners and businesses.Russell said that the number one complaint that he hears about is how high the property taxes are in Pontiac, which even deters businesses from starting up within the city.“The state of Illinois ranks 48 out of 50, only behind California and New York, in states to do business in,” he explained. “We want the businesses that are already here to stay and we want new businesses to come in.”Russell said that during his 20 years on the city council and now as mayor, the group has been trying to figure out what it could do to change the property taxes, and now with new legislation, the city hopes to even the playing field a bit.“As a city, we are a non-home rule city, which is less than 25,000 people, so we don’t have the opportunity that a lot of the bigger cities have to adjust taxes without going through a referendum,” Russell explained. “We can raise the sales tax, which takes the burden out over many people, local and otherwise.”The city has pledged to rebate at least $500,000 of the money made from the taxes back to commercial and residential property owners alike.Another option homeowners have is to either designate part or all of the return to a pool fund, or keep it in its entirety.Russell’s goal in speaking with Issues and Eggs attendees was to spread the word about the referendum so people would have a clear understanding of the proposal.After his speech, which was similar to the one he gave Wednesday, Oct. 3, at the city hall chambers, he took questions from the audience.One man asked, “How would you convince renters to be on board?”“I’m a landlord also,” Russell said. “My taxes go up on my buildings every year. I’m hoping most landlords will get a big enough rebate that they’re not going to have to raise rent.”“People may argue this, but some ask the question, ‘Who pays a business’ taxes?” And the answer to that is ‘Their customers.’ The quickest way to drive customers away is to raise prices,” another person said.A third question was posed by Mike Ingles, former Pontiac mayor and current Livingston County Board member. “Two questions. First, why not just lower taxes with a levy, and you mention giving the pool fund 10 years and if it hasn’t accumulated enough money, do I get my money back?” he asked.“We talked about that a couple of weeks ago,” Russell said. “We don’t have an answer for that but we hope to have funds somehow but we haven’t gotten a fund set up yet. This is brand new, so we don’t know yet, but the goal would be to get it back to everyone, which is doable, because we’ll have the records. As to your other question, I fought really hard years ago to get tax caps in this county. If we lower our levy, because of tax caps, and the federal government continues its cuts, we wouldn’t be able to get it back to that point,” which is why it stays at the current level, he said. “It would have the same effect, you get the same amount of money back, but it gives us a little protection in the future.”Russell continued, asking everyone to spread the word about the referendum.“It’s a very positive thing. The trick is getting the word out. If you think this is a good thing, you have to tell as many people as you can,” he said.Andy Ferguson, one of the people who is spearheading the movement for adding a new outdoor swimming facility to Pontiac, said he’s been attending all the meetings concerning the tax referendum and aside from the probability of people donating money to a cause he’s been working very hard for, he’s in favor of the referendum.“I think this is good for the city. If it lowered my property taxes, it would be great. My property taxes went up $300 last year and I did nothing to improve my house, so it was a deal where I was wondering why,” Ferguson said. “As for the pool, I’m hoping we can raise enough money in two to three years, but with the way the mayor was talking, it may be more like five to seven, but I believe it will be sooner than later, especially because I know a lot of people really want a pool.”

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